The present application relates to an integrated circuit (IC) chip and a method of forming the same. More particularly, the present application relates to an IC chip including a back-end-of-the-line (BEOL) metal-insulator-metal (MIM) capacitor in which an isolation element is present that can disconnect the BEOL MIM capacitor or electrode plate from active circuitry if the BEOL MIM capacitor becomes defective.
On-chip capacitors including metal-insulator-metal (MIM) capacitors are essential for many semiconductor chips. For example, MIM capacitors are frequently utilized as decoupling capacitors for mitigating power supply or switching noise caused by changes in current flowing in an integrated chip. MIM capacitors are often integrated into a back-end-of-the-line (BEOL) metallization stack, at a position between an underlying first metallization layer and an overlying second metallization layer. When integrated, a MIM capacitor is commonly formed as a stacked structure including planar electrode plates.
For a high performance semiconductor chip, most of the chip area may be covered by MIM capacitors. The defect density for the MIM capacitors needs to be very low due to large total area that the MIM capacitors occupy on a chip. The MIM capacitor is principally a very cheap element, but if the MIM capacitor causes chip yield loss or early fails due to defects, the overall cost of the chip will increase. There is thus a need to provide a method to minimize the defective MIM capacitor impact on chip yield and lifetime.